Coal mine cave-in traps 12 miners in north China

Twelve miners have been trapped in a coal mine that caved in in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, local authorities said Friday. The accident happened at about 4 a.m. Friday in Yuanlin Coal Mine in Xianghuang Banner (county) of Xilin Gol League, which is about 350 km northeast of the capital city of Hohhot, according to the regional coal mine safety supervision bureau. The cave-in is the latest in a series of coal-mine accidents to have hit China recently. On Nov. 10, an underground gas outburst in south China's Yunnan province trapped 43 miners, of whom 35 have been confirmed dead while the other eight remain missing. On Tuesday, another gas leak in a coal mine in central China's Hubei province killed six miners.